It was beyond bearing. He would break down the prison walls at all costs. He was tired to death himself of civilisation; they would go into the wilderness and be happy. "I will ask Mrs. Ramsay to come with us," he said, knowing that he had not the slightest intention of so doing; but if he was to take the law into his own hands, he would require a few days to mature his plans. "She can't come," he said two days afterwards; "she isn't quite up to it." Aura looked for a moment as if she were back in the iris fields. "I'm sorry," she began. "But," went on Ned coolly, "I believe I could take you there and back by the four-cylinder Panhard in a day--if you don't mind starting rather early. Do come. I--I want a holiday too--badly." He looked like it. "Poor Ned," she said softly, for she had begun to realise her responsibilities towards him also. That was the worst of life; the great hidden tie between all creatures could so seldom be felt or seen until some wound stripped the quivering flesh, and left the ligaments bare. "Yes! I will come," she said after a pause, making up her mind that there, standing on the floor of heaven, she would try and make him understand that she was worth no man's passionate love. "When shall we go?" Something seemed to rise in his throat and choke him. "The first fine day. Shall we say to-morrow? But we must start at five; and breakfast by the way." "At five!" she echoed joyously, looking more like herself than she had done for months. "Oh Ned! how jolly! I haven't been up at five for ages and ages. It disturbs Ted so--and then," she hurried on--"the servants loathe it. They hate you to know how late they are." She was ready waiting for him, with quite a colour in her cheeks when he drove up. It was a delicious morning, cool, clear, full of shafted lights and shadows from the rising sun. Aura tilted back her head triumphantly and gazed up at the little white fleecy clouds that were drifting steadily overhead before the westerly breeze. "I'm not going to look at anything grimy to-day," she said with a laugh; "and even Blackborough can't soil those! They are too gladly far away. Do you know that often when I've nothing else to comfort me, I lie on my back in the garden and dream they are just feathers out of a great, soft pillow where I am finding rest!" He felt a pang for her innocent self-betrayal, but he retorted gravely, "That is your fault for not being contented with a good civilised wire-mattress." She laughed out loud. "How nice of you to talk nonsense! It is exactly like old times; exactly!" she cried. "Ned! do you think we were made to forget? I don't." "Some things," he said soberly, "are best forgotten." "Not many," she replied cheerfully. "Sometimes, Ned, I seem to get at the meaning of so much by remembering, and then I see how all these little lives of ours work into one big whole; and then--and then." She was silent, her eyes still upon the clouds.